“Doesn’t matter. Just choose what looks good to you,” Gem said, and though Rusty looked incredulous, he picked a muted, minty green.
“Your funeral,” he murmured as he took Gem’s top hand and painted his pinky nail. Moving between hands, he slicked each pinky the same color, then retrieved a light purple and started on Gem’s ring fingers.
To fill the silence, Gem rambled. He wasn’t even sure what he was rambling about, but the look of concentration on Rusty’s face as he carefully and meticulously painted Gem’s nails was doing things to him. Annoying things. Sexy things. And Gem had no idea how to handle those thoughts when he was this blitzed.
So he prattled on about everything and nothing. By the time the nails of all six hands—except his thumbs—were painted alternating greens and purples, he realized he’d been talking at length about the sex party he’d attended when he was twenty-three where he’d gotten spit-roasted twice by two different pairs of twins. Normally, he was very proud of that story, but since Rusty hadn’t spoken a word in the past ten minutes, Gem pressed his lips together, swallowing down his next bout of word vomit.
Wiping the brush of the nail polish on the bottle to remove the excess, Rusty finally glanced up from Gem’s nails and cocked his head. “Then what?”
“Hmm?” Gem asked, chin resting on his raised knees.
“You stopped in the middle of your story,” Rusty said as he painted Gem’s thumb.
“Well, I’ve been talking for ages. I don’t wanna annoy you.”
Rusty frowned but didn’t look up. “It’s not annoying. I like listening to you talk.”
The words shouldn’t have punched through Gem’s chest the way they did, and it took him an extra second to reply. “You do?”
“It’s not like I have much to say,” Rusty said with a sly smirk. “Keep going. What happened with the second set of twins?”
Feeling warm and tingly and flustered, Gem pressed his chin harder into his knees and said, “I dated them both for three weeks, but I may havethought they were the same person the whole time. When we all realized it, they werenotimpressed.”
Rusty burst into laughter, and Gem joined him, giggling deliriously into his kneecaps. The Pyclon’s rough laugh flitted over Gem’s skin, sinking into his bones, and he fought a shiver.
Poking Rusty’s knee with his tarsal claw, Gem said, “Okay, your turn. Tell me something you’ve never told anyone.”
“Is that part of girl-talk too?”
“Yes.”
Another husky chuckle. “Okay. It’s not a secret, exactly, but on slow nights on Flesh Street, I used to dress more femme. Like skirts and corsets and shit.”
Gem narrowed his eyes doubtfully. “You did not.”
Rusty nodded. “I did. I don’t know if it was the pink fur or if a lot of customers just had a feminization kink, but business would always pick up.”
Nearly causing Rusty to spill polish, Gem grabbed him by the biceps. “Be so fucking for real right now.”
“I’m being so fucking for real,” Rusty deadpanned.
With an excited screech, Gem rubbed Rusty’s arms almost violently. “If you ever want to borrow a dress, girl, I got you covered.”
That made Rusty laugh again, and he shook his head as he moved on to Gem’s third thumb. “Nah, it’s not really my thing. I just did it for the tips.”
Releasing his arms, Gem sat back and studied Rusty from furry ear to paw. “I just can’t picture it. But I’m sure you pulled it off.”
“Godsdamned right I did,” Rusty said with a wink. “Your turn. Tell me something no one else knows.”
“I don’t know if I have a secret that can top you in a corset,” Gem admitted as he wracked his brain. “Technically, this is also not a secret, but when I was twelve, I went through a saggy jeans phase.”
Utter delight brightened Rusty’s expression. “No fucking way.”
Biting his bottom lip, Gem nodded. “Yeah, it got bad. Loose, saggy jeans and oversized t-shirts. And…” He shook his head, unable to voice the last part.
“And?” Rusty prompted, sounding like his birthday had come early.
“And wide-brimmed caps,” Gem confessed, pantomiming above his head, “angled to the side!”
